


goosegrass, weeping willow

by isolationist



Category: Tennis no Oujisama | Prince of Tennis
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, M/M, Mutual Pining, Nobility and Scholars, Teacher-Student Relationship, Unresolved Emotional Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-11
Updated: 2021-01-11
Packaged: 2021-03-14 21:47:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28677654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/isolationist/pseuds/isolationist
Summary: kirihara akaya was eighteen and believed himself in love with yanagi renji. it was youthful infatuation, something passing, or mere confusion born from constant company during their otherwise lonesome travels.
Relationships: Kirihara Akaya/Yanagi Renji
Kudos: 2





	goosegrass, weeping willow

Kirihara Akaya is Yukimura Seiichi’s cousin, the son of the younger half-brother of Yukimura’s late father. However slight, there is a family resemblance between them; the wavy hair that on Kirihara curls fully, their gazes ablaze in the same manner, the arrogant tilt of their mouths when faced with those deemed so far beneath them that it were an affront to dignify their presence with any acknowledgement. Yanagi believes Kirihara and Yukimura’s sister may have a similarly sloped nose, but it has been long since he last saw the girl.

Kirihara Akaya is eighteen and believes himself in love with Yanagi. It is youthful infatuation, something passing, or mere confusion born from constant company during their otherwise lonesome travels.

 _Take him to experience the world_ , Yukimura had ordered, too occupied at Rikkai to have the time or opportunity to provide Kirihara with this piece of education himself — and harbouring far too much faith in Yanagi to see it through in a satisfactory manner, that he would not bother to consider the option of there having been anyone more suited to take on a shadow.

They have all cycled through the role of caretaker for the young lord Kirihara; Kuwahara and Marui for his younger years, Yagyuu and Niou for the middle teens, and now the role falls upon him. Certainly, more than anyone, Sanada has and will remain a continued presence overseeing matters.

A piece of gravel moves beneath the sole of his shoe, scratching against a larger rock with a noise that pulls him out of his thoughts. The gravel skitters down the surface of the rock, the slope gentle but enough to drag it further down the path they’ve been walking up the hill. Yanagi raises his head. There, not far up ahead the road is an inn.

The building is smaller than Yanagi had thought from the description given, and from the noise level seeping through the walls and open doors, it would not come as a surprise to hear it is fully booked. Still, Kirihara whoops quietly at the sight of it, a small victorious noise. He is tired of sleeping at the mercy of the skies and he voices his feelings once more. Were Yanagi more talkative he would have agreed. The weather is unpredictable, the nights turning cooler again.

Most would assume he missed what now seemed foreign luxuries; the lustrous silks in muted colourways he had used to wear and the carefully selected oils for his hair, but more than that Yanagi missed the library he had only recently been able to set up. A simple pleasure yet the very height of luxury in his eyes; a collection of books and scrolls, the care put into acquisition and upkeep a small source of pride as much as an indulgence.

Its beginnings had been humble, only a few gifts from Sanada, a couple more from Yukimura, items he had mentioned or they knew from years of friendship would interest him. It hadn't been until the collection had grown further, another book he brought in secret from the imperial library where he knew it wouldn't be missed, and another a book that a friend had forgotten in his rooms but never had asked to have returned, that he had begun to think of it as a library.

Yanagi missed his library, spending the day in it. A private collection that he hoped one day would rival the one located in the Rikkai palace, if not in physical size then in terms of subject matter and content. He spent time curating it carefully, keeping everything to a high standard.

For his birthday last year, Yanagi had been surprised by a gift from Kirihara. It was with utmost certainty that he knew the gift had been picked and chosen with help. Three books, each carefully wrapped in fine paper to protect them. Two of the titles volumes of a guide imported from a faraway country across the sea, books Yanagi had been looking for and made it known he had wanted among friends and acquaintances both.

The third book was smaller, thinner, and not at all in line with the others in content or origin, not even thematically close. Children's stories, just slightly more obscure and some very specific to the mountainous regions of Rikkai, by the foothills of the tall mountain towering in the skyline rather than the plains closer to the ocean. It would have been so easy to make a snide, pointed comment to discourage Kirihara's at the time only burgeoning affections for him. He hadn't. The book remained in his rooms, carefully wrapped up again with thin mulberry paper to keep it safe and protected.

When they had last passed a city, Yanagi had picked up a book in a small shop a lot less busy due to its location in an alley off the marketplace. At the time Kirihara was distracted by sweets and street performers, and Yanagi had taken the moment to allow himself some of the same freedom, to slip away and find distractions that brought him joy. He had seen in that shop, with rare collectables and cheap throwaways both, that same book he was gifted by Kirihara. His fingers ran down the spine, the price tag ignored.

There is only one bed in the room. Yanagi had assumed so much from the way the inn’s owner had said, the nervous wringing of his hands once he realised the insinuations regarding the nature of their relationship had fallen short. It matters little, as long as they have a roof above their heads. The details can be sorted when the time comes, they are only looking for a moment’s rest before dinner.

He washes his face and hands with care, enjoying the scent of the soap as he gets his hands clean. The pouch with their coins hangs securely at Yanagi's waist, and the smaller pouch with silver hangs from his neck and hidden beneath his robes. He adjusts it so no lines can be seen.

“You must be glad to return to your library,” Kirihara says. Yanagi casts him a glance, face mostly hidden behind the towel as he pats his skin dry. He lounges on the bed, body in an open and casual sprawl. Had it been anyone else, it might have looked inviting — Kirihara breaks any illusion of such things when he scratches the back of his head, yawning loudly without covering his mouth. To say his actions were full of boyish roguishness would be generous.

“You know what you said before,” says Kirihara, “about your thoughts getting away from you.”

Yanagi remains quiet.

“Do you really want to return to Rikkai? We— we could, you know,” he says, stumbling slightly over half-promises so painfully earnest Yanagi has to remind himself that beneath it all, Kirihara is younger not only than himself but than his years belie. Than his loud, brusque actions hide.

“What is it you think we could do? Elect not to return?” It is like promises from tales of lovers, highly romantic. Idealistic. Immature. Yanagi gives a precursory glance to Kirihara’s form. Still sprawled out, but tenser now. Ready to pounce, leap forward — in attack or to escape, there’s no telling.

The unpredictability of Kirihara’s nature is unsettling for someone like Yanagi, who prides himself in his ability to understand and predict human nature. That undercurrent of instability is impossible to remove, it seems; that child not yet ready to taste the bitter defeat of maturity and control. Restraint is a word he has barely taken into his mouth despite the concept being pushed again and again until it took root most subconsciously, growing crooked and untrue. That is a failure at Yanagi's hand.

Kirihara had once been wild to the point he was likened to an animal; a feral beast ready to lash out at any second, at anyone who came his way. Yanagi could recall with perfect detail the set of Yukimura’s mouth, how his jaw clenched, and eyebrows drawn into a mien so severe it could only be called terrifying.

There lived a devil in young lord Kirihara, it was said. It was supposed to explain the circumstances in which Yukimura had found him; the ropes and the bruising. The dried blood.

A fiery temper bad enough to have him lose control once pushed far enough, yes. Nothing beyond that, as evidenced by the lack of success in forcing the spirit out.

Though fair, Yukimura had little kindness concerning certain aspects of his life. He steered Rikkai with confident control and oversaw each step of the militarisation seeping through the core of the region more and more by each passing year. On the battlefield, he was unstoppable. When Kirihara first came to live in the Yukimura residence, there was a long discussion among Yukimura, Sanada, and himself about the best course of action.

The fearlessness and raw power that surges through Kirihara was not something that could be left alone, unutilised. How to best forge that power into a weapon was less clear.

As such, they each have their role in rearing the young lord Kirihara. Yanagi himself far less hands on, until now, too preoccupied with courtly matters and building bridges, securing allegiances and fealty on behalf of Rikkai and of Yukimura; the two now being so synonymous that no distinction could really be made.

With a few coins more they have dinner in the hall among the other patrons, the inn owner apologising that they lack the space to bring meals to the rooms. Yanagi doesn’t say that it’s no matter, simply inclines his head. The table set for them is adequate, nothing to complain about even if he would have preferred to dine alone. Kirihara eyes the leftover dishes at the other tables curiously as they wait, thankfully quiet.

It is late enough in the evening for the room is less busy with dinner service and most of the people still in it have moved on to drink, the atmosphere something less Their food arrives quickly enough for Kirihara to only have begun to shift restlessly, subtly stretching his legs to keep them from falling asleep, and he's firmly planted in place once more to lean across the table to serve them both meals. Yanagi does not have to specify which foods are to his taste, and it is with an odd sense of amusement he takes in the certainty with which Kirihara grants himself the larger cuts of meats or the richer broths.

“What do you know of it?” Yanagi asked. His tone was light, entirely neutral. A look of confusion crossed Kirihara’s face. Yanagi would have sighed, but not even Kirihara would misunderstand such poorly hidden exacerbation.

Kirihara was not a child, even if he’s not yet gone though his coming of age ceremony, and Yanagi knew how others spoke. It was impossible for him to not know, or at least have heard conversations, of sexual relations between men. Of those who keep the company of both, of those who only keep the company of men.

 _Onna-girai_ , woman hater, some people referred to natures as his. Yanagi had never considered it such, merely a lack of interest in intimacy with a woman. Indifference was not hatred. If not desiring women was hate, he wondered what the acts of other men would be called.

"Sensei," Kirihara said, almost whined with how the title dragged out, flustered at having been called out for speaking on topics he was far from knowledgeable on. Flustered perhaps from the topic itself. Confirmation that he had no idea what he spoke of, when he spoke of his affection for Yanagi. If he had bragged, or attempted to talk his way out of it, he would have only made it more clear. 

Desire, any man could feel. 

How the intensity of such feelings were wielded made all the different. He could only hope that this conversation would not spurn Kirihara to listen more closely to story tellers or the innuendo filled songs performed. If Kirihara learnt to focus his ardour, then one day he might become dangerous with charm.

They retreat to their room after dinner, which had ultimately been a primarily quiet affair, Kirihara scarfing down food as though he had not eaten in days. His words from earlier still ring in Yanagi’s ears. If there is somewhere aside from Rikkai where Yanagi belongs, it is in the imperial court. His days in the capital city aren't ones he longs for, but all the same it has been indubitable that this was true.

"Did you see value in our travels, Akaya?" he asks, just a touch careful.

Kirihara sits up fully, wraps his arms around his legs. He seems much younger in moments like that, obstinate juvenility to his actions as he refuses to even look in Yanagi’s direction. Yanagi doesn't ask for eye contact, nor a head kept respectfully low; he only wishes for Kirihara's usual mannerisms. This deviation is another sign of a worsened mood, and since that first time they had been alone while it happened, Yanagi has learnt how to best bypass it without indulging Kirihara's whims.

There is no reason to walk carefully around him, won't help the matter any. Yanagi sits down on the empty space of the bed.

"I've enjoyed it," Kirihara says then, sudden and surly.

"Being away from Rikkai?" Yanagi questions, leadingly, aware that coaxing is his best bet to have Kirihara speak his mind. Better now to convince him to work through and process anything that might keep him from performing at his best upon return; because return they will. The reply is quick.

"No! Or that too," Kirihara acquiesces, "'s nice to not be, hm, to.. to be seen as just me. But I meant-- sensei, I've enjoyed our time together."

Yanagi should have expected it, but his judgement had been clouded. He left himself open for an attack, for the topic he so resolutely refuses to let Kirihara speak of to be brought up. The affection, the curious tenderness to Kirihara's voice. It shouldn't be there, yet it is. There is a directness to Kirihara he has yet to teach him to leave aside even if it would be in everyone's best interest if he did. Surely, Yukimura is not expecting miracle work.

The tie in Kirihara's hair is bright scarlet red, the same piece of ribbon Yanagi had handed him this morning.

"I know," Kirihara continues, not really waiting for Yanagi to speak, "that you don't want me to talk about it, but I don't understand-- is it so wrong?"

"It is not wrong, Akaya," Yanagi says. It's more open than he would like for it to be. His eyes find the fraying edge of his kosode, thankfully clean but from stray specks of dirt and grime from the roads, and a few pine needles that need to be brushed off. "To feel what you do."

"You're not much older than me," Kirihara says. If that were the only issue, Yanagi would have thrown caution to the wind and allowed himself the indulgence of a lover who wanted him. This boy, Yanagi thinks, understands nothing of the world still. He had been hindered by the weight of his early years for too long, and now he's still trying to catch up to his actual age. There is a reason for his coming of age ceremony not yet having been held.

“Sensei,” Kirihara said. It made something like guilt settle deep in Yanagi. He wished to say he lacked awareness of what others thought, what the assumption was seeing them travelling alone as they are, with the difference in age and height. He wished to say he never had any thoughts of it himself, though the exact line in his mind would be a surprise to any other. In the months since Kirihara and he left Rikkai, Kirihara has grown taller, his body filled out more despite the at times plain diet.

His hair was growing longer, curls slightly less wild from their weight but still reminiscent of the seaweed he has been teased and derided for. Yanagi wordlessly handed him a ribbon, making sure to keep a few with him in case Kirihara were to lose his items as he had proven prone to. A grateful expression; a small smile, Kirihara’s green eyes glittered.

The gentle stream was clear and cool, a streak of silver between moss and rocks, with long grass growing tall on either side. His feet were tired, and Kirihara’s had to be too. The grass was wet with morning dew, not yet touched by the rays of sunlight where it grew hidden among trees.

It would tickle were it any shorter, but now it only soothed.

“Yes, Akaya?” Yanagi replied after a moment, he knew that a hair tie had not been the reason for Kirihara to call for him. He would have to commend the boy for not launching into the whinging he would have only months ago, though the growth was so slow despite its steadiness that it was not always noticeable until looked back upon.

Kirihara smiled. “You seem distracted, sensei.”

“I must apologise,” Yanagi replied. There was truth to the words, most absolutely. It would bring forth shame, were Yanagi not already burdened with that feeling from earlier. “It seems the closer we get to Rikkai, the more my thoughts get away from me.”

"Allow me to comb your hair," Yanagi says. The inn luckily has a hot spring for them to indulge in, as asking them to heat water for a bathtub feels mildly inconvenient when they will return to travel tomorrow again already. Kirihara hangs his head low, still bothered from their talk. He is all too easy to read.

With Kirihara’s curls detangled, they head down to bathe; it is but a brief indulgence necessitated from the overhanging need for sleep and the unavoidable promise of another long day ahead of them, but the hot water is heavenly, washing away the tenseness and weariness their conversation and the days alike have brought about.

Wrapped in their inner robes and skin still warm from the water, then comes the matter of the bed. There is just the one, and to Yanagi it isn't a question of who it belongs to — his family may have a good standing, but he is with the young lord of Rikkai, their age disparity and his own seniority aside. Of course, Kirihara rejects the idea. Loudly, so that Yanagi must hush him out of respect for their neighbouring guests. The unwavering stern look he shoots Kirihara does the trick. He then says,

"I won't fight you on this."

"I'm not sleeping on the bed, sensei," Kirihara sneers, "I have had some sense beaten into this head of mine. It is not done."

His words are enough to bring the hint of a smile to Yanagi’s face. 

"We can share," Kirihara suggests, then. His face is open, honest, and from the way he says it.. it seems genuine, with no expectations nor any untoward intentions. Not that it would be like Kirihara to take advantage of a situation when it comes to romance or sex, still too oblivious to understand when either men or women come to him for that reason; youth or infatuation or both blinding him.

The rice fields were empty, the harvest completed, and the trees with coloured leaves just barely hung on to the branches stretched out as far as one could see. There was a certain melancholy that came with the season. Yanagi had always appreciated it; the quiet of it, the dry grass, the world ablaze with reds and yellows.

Home. Rikkai. With each step they made the distance shrink. Though it had taken longer than initially anticipated, if they kept this pace they would be sure to arrive safely before winter set in. 

It had been early autumn when they left last year, barely out of summer. The last two of Kirihara’s birthdays they had spent together. Evening dusk was fast to fall upon them, but they had met a traveller a few hours ago who had mentioned an inn were they to continue their route. Yanagi glanced at his charge.

Kirihara Akaya was Yukimura Seiichi’s cousin, the son of the younger half-brother of Yukimura’s late father. However slight, there was a family resemblance between them; the wavy hair that on Kirihara curled fully, their gazes ablaze in the same manner, the arrogant tilt of their mouths when faced with those deemed so far beneath them that it were an affront to dignify their presence with any acknowledgement.

Kirihara Akaya was eighteen and believed himself in love with Yanagi. It was youthful infatuation, something passing, or mere confusion born from constant company during their otherwise lonesome travels.

Clean skin, clean bedding. The feeling of it for himself, and the scent of it too, a welcome change.

It has been very long since Yanagi shared a bed like this, with any partner. The warmth from Kirihara's skin is both natural, his body always running just slightly high, and the remaining heat of the bath. The empty space between their bodies is too small to be entirely comfortable, but Yanagi lays on his back with only eyes for the empty dark ceiling that is beyond sight in the darkness of night. Perhaps, this was as foolish an idea as he had thought.

It has been too long since he last had a bed partner, and he refuses resolutely to think of any by name, but his body remembers what usually comes with it with slight interest. 

This had been a bad idea, just like so many of the ideas Kirihara came with. He exhales slowly, eyes closed.

The rain starts slow. For the first several moments it leaves Yanagi to wonder if it's there at all, so quiet and gentle it is as the pitter-patter of it hitting the roof comes about quietly. The sound wraps around him with comfort, and it grows with the degree of rain coming down.

"Sensei," comes Kirihara's voice, almost hidden by the rain. Yanagi could feign sleep.

"Yes," he replies, tone slightly questioning. He can feel Kirihara shifting from how the mattress dips and moves, but it seems that the space remains what it was. The hair on his arms stands up from the skin and he exhales slowly. The quiet is all the more dangerous.

He waits for Kirihara to continue, only the sound of their slow breathing and the rain any indication of the time passing. The intimacy of the moment isn't lost to him. The threads of the bedding beneath his fingertips feel almost rough, sensitivity heightened.

"I'm grateful for everything until now," Kirihara says, unbidden. "For your kindness."

"I... Akaya."

"I don't, I am not looking to burden you any further," Kirihara continues, as though Yanagi had not said anything. Restraint colours the determination, but he seems as though he needs to get the words out. To say his mind. All too many times he has done just that, and Yanagi has let him. Allowed it. What will another indulgence matter, he thinks, perhaps this may be what leads to Kirihara coming to peace with his feelings. He regrets it almost immediately. "But you must know how I feel. How I, I like you."

 _I do_ , Yanagi thinks. He doesn't say it. Kirihara's directness is uncomfortable, making his skin itch. His heart beats faster in his chest — nothing close to racing, though. May Kirihara think his quietness is either sleep or rejection, in either case that would be better. Yanagi can't bring himself to say the words, knowing Kirihara would catch the untruth to them after these months of having learnt each other so well. It isn't without fondness he thinks

Yanagi thinks of the book in his sachet, the one he bought as it reminded him of Kirihara's gift. If it were anyone else, anyone more knowing of the workings of Yanagi's mind, they would see it for what it was.

Kirihara shifts again, the sheets rustling from his movement. An exhalation of breath, something that could maybe be called a sigh. 

The rain seems sempiternal. The moon won’t be out tonight.

**Author's Note:**

> this is my piece for tenirabi zine 2, which you should absolutely check out [here](https://tenirabizine.carrd.co/) for a lot of fun creative content! this was originally intended to be low fantasy setting, though it def bled into more of a fake-historical one, making it more difficult to categorise? alas, i make less claims to historical accuracy than usual. that said:
> 
> \+ coming of age ceremonies were performed between ages of 10-20 among the aristocracy, and were generally held at the higher end of the spectrum in times of unrest   
>  \+ this ties into the concept of nanshoku, and how it was traditionally between a man who has undergone his coming of age ceremony and a youth that had not (paraphrasing wikipedia), and how it plays into the perceived dynamic between the two characters in this fic    
>  \+ i imagined yanagi to be in his early to mid twenties for this, stretching the canon age difference slightly


End file.
